The Blue People of Cloud Planet

by Brian Wolfenden

  The inner door hissed open and AJ and the astronauts followed Martha into the cryo-unit. They had seen many strange sights but this white floor- tiled, white-ceilinged, igloo-shaped room shrieked cleanliness and the astronauts felt almost afraid to enter. There was a constant noise of equipment beeping, valves opening and closing and the hiss of air and other gases pressurising and venting.

  Martha beckoned them towards the middle of the room where seven lozenge shape units stood on complex support machinery fed by a multitude of pipes and wires. Behind each an LCD screen bristled with data, graphs and various coloured lights. Six of the structures were closed and the seventh stood open with its upper half retracted.

  The four astronauts peered closer into the dark translucent upper halves of the closed units and saw that each contained a body!

  ‘My God!’ Olivia gasped, ‘Are they alive?’

  ‘Very much so,’ Martha replied, ‘let me introduce you to our six cryo – hibernation volunteers.’

  ‘Who on Earth would volunteer to be frozen?’ Steve queried.

  ‘Well, firstly they’re not frozen but kept at exactly 5 degrees Celsius and secondly on Earth there are still some really bad human beings.’

  Martha paused for effect and then moved closer to the first unit.

  ‘Let me introduce you to Freddie Riggs, 20 years for armed robbery, killed a security guard – no parole. We offered him 15 in cryo and he’s done 10, five to go – he’ll soon be our longest serving cryo.’

  Before the astonished astronauts could respond, Martha moved to the second unit. ‘Lisa Greenfield, killed her young child, very sad case, 10 years but could be out in seven for good behaviour – accepted five from us – one down four to go.’

  Martha detailed the next four criminals and then stood before the last open unit. ‘Joe ‘bully’ Saunders, 10 years for serious aggravated assault, no parole, accepted seven from us – went home 4 weeks ago in surprisingly good health and hardly looking a day older!’

  ‘My biggest concern using criminals was maintaining the secrecy and security of the operation at Mars Base. Therefore I chose only those candidates susceptible to hypnosis so that all memories of their stay at Mars Base were erased before returning to Earth.’

  ‘Is this legal? Is this moral?’ Alison asked. She looked a bit shaken. Olivia was also looking very concerned and Scott wondered if she was thinking about having to go into one of those dark units. They had all heard about cryo – hibernation and that AJ had been through it and survived OK; but now they were confronted with the reality!

  ‘Oh yes, approved at World Council, ........ moral, well, I will let you judge, I’m sure you wouldn’t want to go through this without full and realistic testing and we’ve successfully cryo’d 18 criminals over the last 15 years – and not lost one – Oh, and of course, AJ has been through it out there! But let me give you some of the technical stuff.’

  ‘It is not possible to freeze someone and then thaw them out in some years’ time – the body is 75% water and when that turns to ice it expands – think of the damage to delicate nerve ends, capillaries. If you cool someone down, they start shivering in an attempt to generate heat and if they can’t generate enough they die of hypothermia. The key to cryo – hibernation was to cool the body very slowly and at the same time to slow the body functions so that they required very little heat to maintain life. The breakthrough in animal testing 30 years ago was the use of new strains of genetically engineered DNA which were introduced into the body as it cooled. These controlled the slowdown of body functions, pulse, brain activity etc. and through an exothermic reaction produced minute amounts of heat right at the key points of activity. Provided that the cooling and warming periods were long enough, the infused DNA balanced the bodily rates and the amount of heat required.’

  Martha continued, her audience quite spellbound. ‘In two words, it works, particularly when combined with these sophisticated cocoons which maintain a perfect environment and gently exercise all parts of the body during the cryo. And what you see here is duplicated in LifeSeeker-1.’

  ‘How long could someone remain in cryo?’ Scott queried, ‘And wake up OK at the end, of course.’

  Martha considered her reply very carefully, well aware that the only cryo ‘failure’ was the loss of StarGazer-1 with Commander Chuck Parker on board.

  ‘I am confident that we could cryo for 50 maybe up to 100 years and certainly for 20 which would get you to Seren. Also, at 5 degrees Celsius, the amounts of gases and drugs consumed are infinitesimally small. These units and the older ones from the Stargazer missions carry enough materials for a hundred year journey – as long as the power source remains active.’

  ‘All very well for you to say that – you haven’t got to go into one of your pods.’ Steve mused sceptically.

  ‘Oh, but I am, hasn’t AJ told you? – I’ve volunteered to be doc astronaut for this mission and my husband, Pete, is coming as chief engineer!’

  AJ smiled; the seven person team for LifeSeeker-1 was now completed.

  ‘A risk assessment is carried out for every new mission and again when any unforeseen changes occur during the operation. I carry out this process against strict criteria, dependent on the type and complexity of the operation, and assign a success rate percentage. Below this number, I, or a member of my family can abort or modify a mission. Even the commander of a starship cannot override me or one of my team.

  ‘At the time, I assessed this journey to Seren at well below the acceptable value, influenced mainly by the absence of the backup starship which would not be ready for another 5 years. However, because of the unprecedented SOS signal and the voluntary crew, the General takes the decision to go early against my documented advice.

  ‘Even I am overruled!’

  BOOK TWO

  JOURNEY TO A STAR

  Chapter 12

  LifeSeeker-2

  ‘Provisioning a starship for a 20 year voyage and then the unknown is a huge undertaking. I ensured that every necessary spare part was carried in sufficient numbers and that all materials and fabrication techniques were available to the crew. The most vital of my tasks was storage of the key gases viz. hydrogen, helium, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, chlorine and other specialised gases which were required by the sophisticated equipment aboard LifeSeeker-1, in particular the cryo – hibernation unit. Water is synthesised on demand by the astronauts using hydrogen and oxygen. The aft section of the central tube of the starship is dedicated to gas storage using a concentric arrangement of reinforced high pressure cylinders to contain the precious gases.

  ‘LifeSeeker-1 can generate a significant force field in order to defend itself and, in ‘emergency red’ condition, can divert most of its power to protecting the starship and its occupants. The most vital requirement is the creation of a streamlined low energy force field to protect it against space dust particles when travelling in ion drive at significant fractions of the speed of light.

  ‘I provisioned LifeSeeker-1 with a large arsenal of weapons from small hand held versions to sophisticated missiles with on board computers to navigate them to specific targets. And, somewhat surprisingly to the astronauts, I included nuclear warheads.’

  One month after seeing the astounding distress signal in the conference room at Moon Base, the seven astronauts were sitting, expectantly, in their command seats in the dome of LifeSeeker-1 which was still in orbit around Mars. During the last week they had trained meticulously in safety and evacuation procedures using the emergency shuttles.

  ‘Fellow astronauts,’ AJ began, ‘before we start our mission, there is one final piece of the jigsaw to show you. I have deliberately kept this off the dome screens.’

  The starship slowly changed direction and then, to the astronaut’s right a huge shape began to appear in the clear dome.

  ‘LifeSeeker 2,’ announced AJ. For a while there was complete silence as the whole of the visible area in front of the astronauts was filled with a behemoth. ‘Sh
e’s more than 1 kilometre away, this is the nearest we’re allowed to approach.’

  There were whistles and gasps from both teams and even Martha and Pete who had already seen the monster many times.

  ‘It’s like an enormous building site in space!’ Scott enthused, ‘How big is that thing?’

  ‘LifeSeeker-2 is the biggest project I have managed since the building of Mars Base. The ion engine itself is 150 metre diameter by 150 metre long, and there will be four 30 metre diameter, 100 metre long modules – two of these are substantially finished and the third is about 50 per cent completed. I have designed the following - command/cryo/utility, accommodation, spare accommodation/utility and a full research unit which I am currently fabricating at Moon Base.

  ‘The research and the spare accommodation modules are ‘removable’ and the plan is to attach them to LifeSeeker-1. There’s a portal on the underside of this starship, which will become a permanent orbiting station around Cloud Planet. But only if this strange world proves sufficiently interesting.’

  Indeed, many parts of the structure were huge arrays of girders yet to be clad with the starship’s outer skin. Whilst around it buzzed shuttles which delivered and attached pre-assembled components from their cargo bays.

  As detailed drawings appeared on the dome, there were many questions but AJ held up his hand. ‘Plenty of time for questions and answers on the first part of our journey but first...’

  The General’s face appeared on the dome. ‘I trust you’re now convinced that there is a second starship and she will be on her way just as soon as possible – that’s my responsibility and promise to you. I will be in mission control at Mars Base full time watching your every transmission and I pray for two things – your safe and healthy arrival at Cloud Planet and that I live long enough to hear it!’ This brought a smile all around. ‘But, of course, I will never meet you again, and that is a fact, so good luck to you all, it’s been an honour knowing you.’ With that his face disappeared.

  ‘OK,’ said AJ, ‘command! Start mission to Seren.’ The astronauts placed their left hands on the console and Zec-C confirmed their identity.

  ‘Mission to Seren - confirmed!’

  The starship veered to a new course and started to accelerate.

  At last, the journey had begun.

  Chapter 13

  The Long Sleep

  ‘The journey took them towards Jupiter where I used the huge gravitational pull to sling shot and accelerate LifeSeeker-1 onto a new course. Then I, or should I now say Zec-C, navigated the starship through the tricky asteroid belt and then to the edge of our solar system.

  ‘Initial power was provided by four conventional rocket engines, fuelled by hydrogen / helium propellant, in a cluster at the centre rear of the ion engine. Even in the vacuum of space these consumed significant amounts of fuel and this was one of the limitations that prevented LifeSeeker-1 from returning.

  ‘Then, 2 months into the mission and travelling at 250,000 kilometres per hour and already 180 million kilometres from Mars, I hand over complete control of LifeSeeker-1 to my trusted assistant, Zec-C.

  ‘I continued to monitor the mission from Mars Base but, even at the speed of light, signals are now taking 9 minutes to reach me and would, of course, take longer as the distance increases.

  ‘Meanwhile I know that Zec-C is now shutting down the conventional engines and preparing to ‘fire up’ the nuclear power reactor. This provides the heat to generate the stream of high speed ions that fire out of the tens of thousands of tubes at the rear of the engine.

  ‘Ultimately pushing the starship to half the speed of light.’

  Weightlessness could be fun in short sessions, but as weeks rolled into months the frustration of slow measured movements tested the temperament of the astronauts. At all times they had to wear seat clamps, or tethers when they were free walking. At night they zipped themselves into specially tailored sleeping bags which were fixed to the surface of their beds.

  They maintained a normal day / night routine in the starship which was artificially controlled by Zec-C. Their mornings were spent in the command dome and focussed on training and discussion of what lay ahead. After lunch they were put through physical training programmes to maintain their fitness and the rest of the day was for leisure.

  But most apparent was the power struggle between Olivia / Scott and Alison / Steve. Both teams wanted desperately to be first to land on Cloud Planet but only one pair would be chosen by the majority vote of all the astronauts. Generally the electioneering was light-hearted but occasionally there were more heated exchanges particularly between Olivia and Steve.

  ‘I notice you’re spending a lot of time lately with Martha in the medical bay,’ Steve said sharply to Olivia, ‘I hope you’re not undermining our team!’

  ‘I object to that insinuation!’ replied Olivia testily, ‘As it happens I’ve been seeing Martha on a personal matter, which is none of your damned business.’

  Of course, the votes of Martha and Pete were crucial and it was hardly surprising that both teams were openly and secretly seeking their support. However, AJ was another matter and they all knew that he would judge purely on professionalism.

  ‘Guys! Lighten up,’ Pete interrupted, ‘it will be over 20 years before we decide and we don’t know if you’ll all wake up after cryo! We may not even need to vote!’

  The humour fell a little flat but it had helped defuse the rising tension. Finally, they approached the stage in their journey which filled them with apprehension and dread. There was no turning back and the mood was sombre as they looked at each other wondering about their unknown future.

  ‘Conventional rockets shut down and ion engine primed for firing.’

  Zec-C informed the astronauts and the mimic display screens changed to show the new status of the starship.

  ‘Command quarter power to ion engine,’ AJ instructed and seven left hands reached to the console to confirm the decision.

  ‘Quarter power applied and steady, course now set for Seren,’

  The astronauts felt a slight force pushing them into their seats as LifeSeeker-1 noticeably accelerated. In a short time their speed was 500,000 kilometres per hour and still accelerating but this was sluggish compared to the speed they would travel when asleep!’

  Then the pivotal moment had arrived as Zec-C announced,

  ‘24 hours and counting down to commencement of cryo–hibernation.’

  The astronauts looked at one another with varying feelings and expressions and said in unison.

  ‘Confirm countdown started.’

  They immediately had their last meal together before cryo and Martha urged that they eat no further food and should drink sparingly, particularly during the final 4 hours to hibernation. She then advised a good night’s sleep and the astronauts separated to their quarters, each with their own thoughts on the uncertain future ahead.

  As they boarded the maglev and travelled towards the accommodation block, Olivia said,

  ‘I always wanted to go to bed with you, Scott, but I didn’t think it would be for 20 years!’

  Seven ghost-like figures clad head to toe in gossamer-thin white breathable tunics shuffled carefully out of the airlock and approached the cryo–hibernation units that would be their homes for the next 20 years. Each carried a bundle of differently coloured tubes in their right hands and Martha led the way. Then they each stood in front of their specifically tailored unit.

  They had practised the procedure several times during the voyage under Martha’s watchful gaze but now it was time for the real thing. Two hours earlier she had personally attached the three intravenous lines and two catheters to each astronaut and they gingerly carried these lines with their connectors as if they held their own entrails.

  Each unit was in its open, recliner position and at a nod from Martha they carefully lowered themselves onto their high tech beds. They engaged the leg, shoulder, waist and groin straps that would hold them in position during
their weightless sleep.

  ‘I am particularly proud of the design of these units especially the surface of the bed in contact with the user. This is comprised of thousands of vertically aligned sprung rods of PTFE plastic, whose smooth dome diameter is 2 millimetres, and they perfectly mould to the body shape providing comfort. But this is secondary to the key functions of the bed. Firstly the rods are raised and lowered a few millimetres in sequential horizontal rows from top to toe ensuring that no part of the body is in constant contact with the bed thus eliminating sores. Secondly, groups of rods are raised and lowered by significant amounts to gently flex the astronaut’s neck, backbone, limbs and fingers to maintain flexibility through the protracted hibernation. All these functions are controlled by the unit’s computer which is programmed with each astronaut’s precise morphology. Signals are sent to the hydraulically controlled pistons at the lower end of each rod enabling the smooth control of every flexing movement. I consider that these beds are a marvel of 22nd century micro-technology.’